As I have been reading these fairy tales, I have begun to think back on my impressions of them as a young child. We have seen that stories like Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White, and Hansel and Gretel have been used to teach morals to children and entertain a more mature audience. After reading and discussing a few of the tales, I can understand why feminists have problems with the characters of Snow White and Little Red Riding Hood. In the Grimm tales (the ones I heard as a child), the girls are very naive and almost meet their ends through their own faults. However, as a child, this was not at all the types of messages I got from the stories. I knew they were fantasy, and not based in reality. They were nice stories used for my entertainment purposes, and I doubt any of the morals the Grimm brothers tried teaching ever actually took affect.

A similar realization occurred a few weeks ago as I went back and watched a popular cartoon from my childhood. When I was younger, I often watched the Nickelodeon cartoon called "The World of David the Gnome." I remember watching the show because of the talking animals and the break from reality the show provided. However, as I watched the show as an adult, I realize that it was constantly trying to teach the children lessons of the opinions of the writers. For example, in the very beginning of the first episode David the Gnome says, "What's the idea of coming into our peaceful forests and blasting away with your noisy guns at every animal you see?" If I had thought more carefully about this, I would have become very upset because my father was an avid hunter. He is not a wasteful hunter (we eat everything he kills), but I would have been devastated to know that I was disappointing a character I loved. Also, the first time David is shown, he is found naked in the bathtub. As a child I thought nothing of this unusual scene, but I now question the appropriateness of this introduction into the world of the gnomes.

In case anyone is interested, here is the very first episode of "The World of David the Gnome."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5oI2mkgDRw

While I am shocked today to learn about the history of the fairy tales, I am not a person to deny my children the same entertainment that I gained from these same tales. I believe more harm would be done by denying my children the stories that all other children will know as they begin school.

That is all for today, will write again soon.